[Pasadena, March, 1921]

Dear Maidie,—­It is six in the morning.  The sun is a long streak of salmon pink in a gray skirt of fog.  Chanticleer is very loud and conquering.  The little birds are twittering all about, in wisteria, in oranges; and over on the hillside, by the cherokee roses, there was a mocking bird that hailed the dawn, or its promise, an hour ago.

And for all this beauty, this gay cheer, this soul-lifting day-breaking I have you to thank.  It is the one most exquisite spot in which I have ever laid my head.  And pity is that I have been so down-cast that I could not feel fully what was here, nor show what I did feel.

Forgive me for my many ungraciousnesses and credit yourself, I beg, with having done all and everything that human hands and heart could do to make me “come back.”

You have spent a lifetime doing good, giving out of your heart, and the only reward you can get is the evidence of understanding in paltry words like these.

F. K. L.

To Alexander Vogelsang Assistant Secretary of the Interior

Los Angeles, March 4, [1921]

Dear Aleck,—­The end has come.  We were identified with an historic period, one of the great days of the world.  And none can say that our part, of relatively slight importance maybe, was not well played.  We did not strut and call the world to witness how well we did.  We did not voice indignation at injustice, and make heroes of ourselves at the price of unity.  And some things we did, and more we tried to do, and all were good.  So I look back over the eight years with some personal satisfaction, for not a thing was done or attempted ... that was unworthy, ignoble, unpatriotic or little.

I am glad to get news of the force, and sorry that I cannot have them all round about me for the rest of my days.  Had I been well I would have been with you this morning, to bid you all good cheer.  It was my hope when I saw you in December that this might be.

I like your plans for the future and, by the starry belt of Orion, I’d like to join you. ...  I am stronger and look very well, but my damn pains are about as frequent and crunching as ever. ...  No one can say that I have not fought a good fight and stood a lot of punishment.  Good luck, dear Aleck.

F. K. L.

To James S. Harlan

Pasadena, March 5, [1921]

My dear Jim,—­That was a fine long letter in your old-time style, and I am doing the unprecedented thing of answering it promptly.  To this I am prompted by the near-by presence of a very handsome young woman formerly named Wyncoop, now Mays, who knows Mrs. Harlan well, having been much at the Crater Club. ...  Who would have thought such a thing possible—­that here as I lie on a couch in a doctor’s office with a rubber tube in my mouth, I should attract the curiosity of a baby who came to see the “funny tube,” and that she should be followed by a nice-looking, blue-eyed, bright-cheeked girl who says, “I believe I saw you once at Lake Champlain.  You know Mrs. Harlan.”